Black women are worthy of good and pleasure-filled sex, whether we know it or not. Renowned psychologist and leading expert in sex research, Dr. Candice Nicole Hargons, is here to empower us to engage in more intentional and enjoyable sex with her new book, Good Sex: Stories, Science, And Strategies For Sexual Liberation.
Liberation is Dr. Hargons’ love language, and within this groundbreaking book, she delves into compelling angles on sexual wellness and liberation, as well as provides a comprehensive view of what good sex can be despite traumas we may have previously experienced. This book invites an expanded perspective on sexual liberation. It tells the stories of good and not-so-good sex, explains the negative sexual scripts that get in the way, and, with the science to support how to experience the sex we desire and deserve, lays a practical road map to realize sexual liberation.
Additionally, she brings to our attention that the sexual scripts we’re used to leveraging in the bedroom probably have been steeped in respectability politics, oppressive “isms,” and sexual shaming that robs us all of the ability to define good sex for ourselves. So, instead, within this book, she offers new scripts – erotic equity and intimate justice – to help us liberate and embrace our sexual selves. Leveraging research from her lab and multidisciplinary research from scholars of all identities, she wants her readers to understand that the ingredients of good sex aren’t prescriptive. Instead, we should use an a la carte approach to help us curate our own ideal sexual experience that is good, for you and for everyone involved.
Good Sex also addresses how racial trauma can impact our sexual experiences, especially as Black women: “Racial trauma weathers us, meaning it erodes our bodies, minds, and sense of self. Racism distracts us from the best parts of life and our strengths. It can consume us to the point where we feel too irritable, tense, and distracted to remember that lovemaking can be a way to release some of that distress. Human touch and physical pleasure can be a balm in the face of racial trauma,” Dr. Hargons shares.
With her book, she sets out to liberate her readers by encouraging them to communicate with their partners regarding their sexual desires, delves into the science behind orgasms, and uncovers the importance of releasing sexual shame and embarrassment.
We spoke with the leading academic and sex expert to understand how her relatability, authenticity, and compelling integration of science helped her to create this captivating book. Read our conversation below.
ESSENCE: Why did you want to create this book?
Dr. Hargons: I was looking to write a book I hadn’t seen before, reflecting on the experiences that aren’t often in good sex books. So I love the books that are out there, but most of them are written by white women, and you miss what it means to be someone who’s not a white woman when you read the books. So, I wrote the book I needed and wanted to read and hoped it would resonate with everybody who could read it.
Why is this book important for Black women specifically?
It’s important because we’re worthy of the best life has to offer, and sex is one of those things that could potentially improve our lives and help us experience pleasure and joy. So, I wanted us to have access to all the good ingredients that make sex good for us.
What makes sex good, and why are we worthy of it?
Some of the ingredients I call “sex seasonings,” if you will, are love and intimacy, passion, pleasure, and nastiness. Most Black women are raised in ways that may cut us off from that. And it’s not because people don’t care about us. In many ways, our families are trying to protect us from something else, so we feel ashamed, or we feel like sex is taboo. Then, when we’re grown, we’re supposed to automatically just cut the switch on and be able to perform and love sex and be good at it and all of these things, when most of us are dealing with the consequences of being raised with an unseasoned sexual menu. And it comes not just from our family. It usually comes from generations and generations of people mistreating Black women, and so they’re trying to protect us, but what it does is cut us off from some of the things that could give us the most joy and pleasure in life. I want to think about it from the context of relationships for a minute, but it can be solo sex as well, thinking about how we cultivate intimacy in relationships.
I don’t know if you’ve heard the phrase, but a lot of people talk about “catching feelings,” as if you’re catching them if it’s cold, and it’s like you want to be able to experience the depth of closeness with someone, intimacy with someone. When it comes to pleasure, what I love in my research is finding that Black men and women have the smallest pleasure gap and the smallest orgasm gap. It means we also have something to teach, so we’re not missing out on things out here. We have good sex, and we also have lessons that we can share with anybody else.
What does good sex mean, exactly? How do you define it?
I let everybody define it for themselves, but the easiest way to say it is sex that is good, too, and good for everybody involved. And that’s why I have the ingredients broken down like that in the book. Because to me, it might be pleasure, it might be love, it might be passion, and to you, it might be intimacy, it might be fun, and it might be communication, and both of those things are equally legit. So, we want to be able to define sex for ourselves and come to some agreement about what it means with our sexual partners so that we can give each other the best of it.
Let’s get down to the science and research used in the book. There are plenty of sex experts and therapists out there, but what sets your book apart, I believe, is the science and the research of it. Can you speak to me about that approach, how your team was able to execute it, and why you decided to include it in your book?
Yes! I work with some of the dopest scientists, like some of the most amazing Black researchers, Black women researchers, in particular, in the world, and our team and sex educators who are out there who don’t do science joined us so that they also could help us think about the questions differently. So we ran this study called the “Big Sex” study a few years ago in 2021, and we asked over 400 Black people, what does good sex mean to you? Give us three words, so we’ve got so many words, which became the book’s foundation. We consolidated to 20 words, but I’m building on research that Dr Shamika Thorpe has done.
I’m one of those people who have felt blocked sexually in the past. Previously, I could have sex, but I wasn’t really into it and didn’t know why. In this book, you talk about adopting some helpful strategies for developing and building intimacy and sex muscle. Please share them with our readers.
Oh, yes. So, my favorite strategies in the book are communication and intimacy. Communication strategies, in particular, are foundational because most of us are scared to talk about them for three reasons. We’re afraid of it because we’re scared for ourselves, like we have a personal threat where we feel like we’re not going to say it right, or we’re going to reveal that we don’t know what we’re doing and feel inadequate. Or we have a relationship level of threat where we feel like we shouldn’t have to talk about certain things in the relationship that people should know, or we feel like it will make things worse than they are instead of improving them. And then we fear our partners. We fear having conversations because we don’t want to hurt somebody’s ego, or we think they might take it the wrong way, or, you know, like that, it will affect them negatively and make them angry. And so that makes sexual communication so hard, but if we can’t talk to each other, the people that we’re having sex with, it is going to be less than satisfying, less than pleasurable. So, I always suggest a strategy for making it meta. And by that, I mean that there is verbal communication. Then there’s nonverbal communication, and the nonverbal takes up much of what we do and means that we don’t say, so if you notice that when you’re about to start a conversation with your partner and your chest gets tight, or you feel yourself hedging. Name those things before you say what you want to say.
I want to talk about Black women accepting that it’s okay for us to have multiple sex partners, especially if you’re single.
So you hit the nail on the head that a lot of people feel like having sex with multiple partners means that something is wrong with you. A lot of Black women, were taught that if they have sex with various people, it says something negative about them. Which makes us afraid of reputations. Most of us have heard the word “fast,” and so it’s like you’re, you’re engaging with sexual representation management by not having sex with the people that you want to have sex with, as opposed to doing the thing that brings you pleasure and joy.
If you get to the point where sex does transform to be good, some might not find it pleasurable due to past traumas. So how can we be sure to have pleasure-filled sex, not just good sex?
It does matter how you heal your traumas, and so what approach you take, whether it’s a sexual or relationship trauma, or any level of trauma that Black women experience, as there are so many things that can traumatize us in this world. It’s about how you take good care of yourself, the practice of feeding yourself with tenderness and compassion is one that I ask all Black women to consider. Sometimes, we can be so hard on ourselves because we believe that if the world is brutal to us (as it has traditionally been), we must be different. And I know many of us were going through a soft girl era, but it looked like we were pretending to treat ourselves with intentional care and tenderness instead of actually putting the practice into action.
What do you want readers to take from this book?
I want readers to see themselves in the book and know that they are worthy, inherently worthy, of everything that they want: pleasure, wisdom, and beyond.